Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Who's on first? Microsoft vs Yahoo! escalates

Break out your scorecards!

After a weekend that saw Jerry Yang and company at Yahoo! say 'not so fast' in response to Microsoft's ultimatum to Yahoo's board on Saturday, the attempt to takeover Yahoo! by Microsoft could be unraveling.


Two stories by Reuters : News Corp is back, this time possibly joining Microsoft in their Yahoo! takeover bid, and Yahoo! may be close to a deal with Time-Warner's AOL.

Earlier today, TechCrunch reported that Yahoo! was in talks with Google to test-drive parts of the Google advertising platform to which Microsoft quickly responded:


"Any definitive agreement between Yahoo! and Google would consolidate over 90% of the search advertising market in Google’s hands".

Steve Ballmer is not the kind of guy that gives up easily. There has been incredible pressure by the markets this week on Yahoo! shareholders.

Is anyone keeping score? This page from Gabe Rivera's tech news aggregator TechMeMe shows 'a few' people are watching :)

Could Yang prevail?

One thing we know for sure. This is material for a very cool movie.